The present invention relates to a tool store device for machine tools, particularly for programmable machine tools for storing, removing, returning and making available tools, in which the tools are arranged singly and/or in groups with their longitudinal axes extending at right angles to the store surface, and wherein tools are gripped by an advance unit and can be taken over at a transfer station from a tool handling device and/or returned by the same.
Tool store devices are used in various machine tools, particularly for the numerically controlled machining of workpieces, e.g. in machining centers. An important problem in such a process is to make available sufficient tools at such a distance, which would not be too great to transfer the tools to the machine tool and then return them subsequently back.
The applicant's European patent 266,646 discloses a tool storage for machine tools and a method for operating the same, in which a rotor is mounted in a rotary manner on a column. The rotor carries two tracks on which are displaceably mounted tool magazines containing tools. In order to make available a single tool or a number of tools, in the case of multiple spindle machines, the tool magazine with the desired tool is coupled to the rotor and moved to a loading and unloading station, where the tool magazine is uncoupled from the rotor, taken over by a gripper station and fixed, so that by using a tool handling device the desired tool can be removed and transferred to the machine tool. By the use of the tool storage, the locations for the individual tools can be very closely juxtaposed, but a magazine-free sector remains unoccupied. Although this storage can be advantageously used both for a single spindle and multiple spindle machine tools, it is mainly directed at use on multiple spindle machine tools.
In a further tool storage of the present applicant according to CH 3941/87, the tools are densely and uninterruptedly arranged over the entire circumference of a cylinder rotor, so that there is no direct access possibility for a tool changer. If the tools are housed in tool magazines on the rotor, then the desired tool magazine on the rotor is moved to a feed unit, which takes over the particular tool magazine and advances it over the length of the tools of the adjacent tool magazines. The desired tool can now be gripped with a tool changer and brought to the intended place of use. If only individual tools are to be removed from the magazine, then a tool advance unit in the form of a displacement arm mounted in the interior of the cylindrical rotor and having a tool gripper is provided. This advance unit grips the desired tool and moves it radially over the length of the adjacent tools, so that it can be taken over by the tool changer. As a result of the uninterrupted arrangement of the tools, the storage capacity of this tool store is increased as compared with the first-mentioned tool storage. Each tool can be advanced by the advance unit arranged in the interior of the cylindrical rotor, because apart from its rotary movement, the rotor can also perform a vertical lifting movement. As the advance unit can in each case only advance one tool, this construction is more suitable for single spindle machine tools than the construction with the feed unit permitting the advance of a complete tool magazine.
Even though in these known tool storages the access time for replacing a tool in the tool spindle is relatively short, it is not possible to overlook the fact that it is not possible to reduce the distance between the tool store and the spindle below a certain limit.